8 Lessons Startups Can Learn From Twitter's Chaotic Creation Story

Most startups will never see anything close to the amount of money Twitter plans on raising during its IPO this week (a reported $1.6 billion) and in fact, three out of four tech businesses fail. Entrepreneurs in training looking to create a successful company, then, might want to know what turned the 140–character sharing service into a viable business worth billions. For answers to that elusive question, Fast Company spoke with Nick Bilton, New York Times columnist and the author of the forthcoming book Hatching Twitter: A True Story of Money, Power, Friendship, and Betrayal. Nick BiltonImage via Twitter Bilton tells the tale of Twitter's founding, which he likens to a murder mystery. Nobody dies, he assures. But, as the title of the book indicates, the company had a tumultuous beginning. The four founders of Odeo, which turned into Twitter, started as friends. "As Twitter grew, the four founders fought bitterly for money, influence, publicity, and control over a company that grows larger and more powerful by the day," explains the book's Amazon page. Out of those ashes, however, emerged a service so powerful it can influence stock markets and revolutions alike. So how did the soon–to–be Twitter billionaires turn chaos into gold? Here are 8 tips drawn from a conversation with Bilton: Lesson 1: Mythical founding stories are just that: myths. "Founding a startup is actually very difficult–– a lot more difficult than I think we sometimes realize when we cover these... Continue reading at 'Fast Company'

[ Fast Company | 2013-11-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
News tagged with: #makes sense #early days #paying attention

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8 Lessons Startups Can Learn From Twitter's Chaotic Creation Story

Most startups will never see anything close to the amount of money Twitter plans on raising during its IPO this week (a reported $1.6 billion) and in fact, three out of four tech businesses fail. Entrepreneurs in training looking to create a successful company, then, might want to know what... Continue reading at Fast Company

[ Fast Company | 2013-11-04 00:00:00 UTC ]
More news stories like this | News stories tagged with: #makes sense #early days #paying attention


Five lessons startup founders can learn from Aziz Ansari's dating struggles

Comedian Aziz Ansari opened up at a Boston marketing conference on Thursday about his dating history, including the tale of unrequited love that ultimately became the genesis of his recently published book. Ansari, who teamed up with a New York sociologist to write the book, "Modern Romance,"... Continue reading at Silicon Valley Business Journal

[ Silicon Valley Business Journal | 2015-09-12 00:00:00 UTC ]
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Bonnie Garmus wrote 'Lessons in Chemistry.' She learned the formula for TV would bring changes

The British author discusses having her bestselling book adapted for an Apple TV+ series starring Brie Larson: "It's different from my vision, but it doesn't mean that it's not as good at all." Continue reading at Los Angeles Times

[ Los Angeles Times | 2023-08-31 10:00:32 UTC ]
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Audiobooks Without Audible: The Hard Lessons I've Learned Routing Around Amazon

With a Kickstarter campaign now underway for the audio edition of his new book, 'Red Team Blues,' Cory Doctorow shares the mistakes of his past campaigns—and why it's all worth it. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2023-03-31 04:00:00 UTC ]
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8 Sad Short Stories to Quickly Bring the Tears

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[ Book Riot | 2023-03-08 11:36:00 UTC ]
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Beneath Its Pink Cover, ‘Lessons in Chemistry’ Offers a Story About Power

The best-selling debut author Bonnie Garmus created Elizabeth Zott, a chemist battling a sexist 1950s establishment, as the role model she craved — and found that readers wanted the same. Continue reading at The New York Times

[ The New York Times | 2022-11-16 14:07:21 UTC ]
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Lessons to Learn From the Kate Clanchy Memoir Fiasco

Why did author Kate Clanchy get an opportunity to rewrite a memoir others called out as racist and ableist? Continue reading at Book Riot

[ Book Riot | 2021-09-03 10:34:00 UTC ]
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8 Short Stories About People Who Want What They Can’t Have

Short stories, to me, are sparked by desire. I don’t mean they’re all love stories, though they certainly can be. I mean they are collisions or conflagrations, small or spectacular traffic accidents in which the desires of one person bump up against the impossible—whether in the form of some... Continue reading at Electric Literature

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In this love story, a few bits of wisdom amid woefully out-of-date ‘lessons’

Massimo Recalcati seems to ignore how people in the 21st century experience love. Continue reading at The Washington Post

[ The Washington Post | 2021-04-23 12:00:00 UTC ]
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Konnie Huq delivers free eco lesson as Piccadilly Press donates 8,000 books

Bonnier Books UK and Konnie Huq have teamed up with the National Literacy Trust to deliver a lockdown eco lesson on the Daily Mail website Mail+, with 8,000 copies of the author's latest book set to be donated to children in Bradford. Continue reading at The Bookseller

[ The Bookseller | 2021-02-26 08:40:56 UTC ]
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Macmillan Learning Announces Winners of First Annual “Black History, Black Stories” Contest

The contest was created by Macmillan Learning "to elevate Black voices in education and in recognition of the fight for social justice inspired by the #BlackLivesMatter movement." Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

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The Hunter Biden story is a crucial moment: does Twitter care more than News Corp about fact-checking?

Tech firms, newly sensitive to fake news, stopped the story circulating. Now the global media giant has roared in outrageMedia organisations shouldn’t publish allegations unless they believe them to be true, after making appropriate checks. This is a normally uncontroversial principle of... Continue reading at The Guardian

[ The Guardian | 2020-10-21 16:30:01 UTC ]
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Duolingo adds short stories to its language-learning iPhone app

Duolingo's library of interactive short stories is finally available for mobile, particularly for iPhones. The language-learning portal's Stories feature, which offers over 100 fully voiced bite-sized stories designed to test your reading and listeni... Continue reading at Engadget

[ Engadget | 2019-10-29 11:00:00 UTC ]
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Advertising lessons learned and reaffirmed by HBO’s ‘Succession’

As an abashed former News Corp employee (thankfully at HarperCollins, one of the Murdoch portfolio’s least-offensive holdings), HBO’s "Succession" is my straight shot of Sunday-night dopamine. The show’s great even if you aren’t attuned to the devastating, thinly veiled media and publishing... Continue reading at Advertising Age

[ Advertising Age | 2019-10-11 11:22:17 UTC ]
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PWedu’s Christian Publishing Summit: Lessons Learned from Top Christian Social Channels

PW’s online immersion course is gathering pioneering industry leaders including editors, authors, and social media strategists for a multi-week guest speaker program from Oct. 30 to Nov. 20. Continue reading at Publishers Weekly

[ Publishers Weekly | 2019-10-09 04:00:00 UTC ]
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Area man attempts to sell self-published book to 50 bookstores in 50 days, learns lesson along the way.

As reported in The Republic, Columbus, Ohio’s Mason Engel had already tried to get his self-published reboot of Orwell’s dystopian classic, 1984, into the hands of New York literary agents—like, right into their actual hands. After reaching number one in Amazon’s dystopian fiction category,... Continue reading at Literrary Hub

[ Literrary Hub | 2019-09-25 15:11:55 UTC ]
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8 Creepy Short Stories to Keep You Up at Night

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[ Book Riot | 2019-08-14 10:34:44 UTC ]
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6 lessons I learned by doing a paid newsletter for a year

A bit of advice before getting into online publishing’s next big thing. Last year, after nearly a decade of freelance tech journalism, I took a leap of faith and launched a paid subscription newsletter.Read Full Story Continue reading at Fast Company

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Lessons learned from promoting audiobooks: what works?

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[ The Bookseller | 2017-07-15 00:00:00 UTC ]
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